Final Exam Review 2015 – AP English III: Language and Composition
To review and prepare for your final exam, be sure to review the
following material along with answering the analysis questions below. 
FRIENDLY FINAL EXAM REMINDERS:
1. Study EARLY and OFTEN!
2. Get sleep the night before and the days leading up to your final exam!
3. Eat breakfast, bring a snack, and something to drink the day of the
final!
4. Bring something to read and work on after the final exam.
5. NO PHONES! NO PHONES! NO PHONES! Did I mention NO PHONES?!
Part I: Rhetoric and Literary Terms
1. Know the definition and an example of the following Rhetoric and Argumentation
Terms (use your Terms Packet!)
a. Parallelism
b. Antithesis
c. Anaphora
d. Allusion
e. Tri-colon
f. Analogy
g. Metaphor
h. Simile
i. Ad hominem reasoning
j. Non-sequitur
Part II: Types of Sentences and Sentence Variations
2. Types of Sentences – know the definitions and be able to recognize examples of
each.
a. Simple
b. Compound
c. Complex
d. Compound-Complex
Part III: Philosophers’ Unit
3. How would each philosopher speak and/or react to each of the works we studied
this semester?
4. Be sure to review the issues, positions and assertions made by the philosophers we
studied including: William Golding’s “Thinking as a Hobby,” Machiavelli’s “The
Prince” excerpt, Plato’s (regarding Socrates) “Crito”, and Plato’s “Allegory of the
Cave.”
Part IV: The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne
5. Review all of the symbols in the Scarlet Letter, some (not all) are listed below:
a. Characters as symbols (Pearl and Chillingworth)
b. Locations
c. The “A”
d. Puritanism as a symbol
e. Magic/Alchemy
f. Sunshine and shadows
6. Review the allusions from The Scarlet Letter and understand the implications of
each in the novel
a. “Pearl of Great Price”
b. The Fall of Adam and Eve
7. Check your Scarlet Letter bookmark to review major motifs and thematic ideas
present in the novel
8. Review your “American Philosophies” notes and review the major components of
Puritanism/Calvinism.
Part V: Moby-Dick, or The Whale by Herman Melville
9. Be sure you understand all of the plot events and major events of Set #8 in the
novel.
10.
What is the climactic scene of the novel?
11.
What is the resolution of the novel? For Ishmael?
12.
Review your Study Guide questions (all 8 sets) from Moby-Dick – especially
the italicized questions.
13.
Study your annotations, notes from class and the motifs and concepts on
your Moby-Dick bookmark.
14.
Reread the short biography about Herman Melville from the start of the unit.
15.
Review the allusions from Moby-Dick and be sure you know what each
alludes to:
a. Jonah and the whale (Biblical)
b. Prometheus (Greek myth)
c. Ahab (Biblical)
d. Elijah (Biblical)
e. Ishmael (Biblical)
f. Rachel (Biblical)
g. Job (Biblical)
16.
Review your “American Philosophies” Notes Chart – specifically the tenets of
Transcendentalism. Be prepared to analyze how certain characters embody the
major tenets of the philosophy of American Transcendentalism.
Directions: Answer the following questions (regarding Herman
Melville’s Moby-Dick) using textual evidence on your own
paper, in ink and in complete sentences. Complete ALL of
these questions and bring them the day of the final exam for 5
bonus points!
1. How is this a story about the power of people who defy
conventions, crossing over into eternity with only their ego?
2. Find an example or two of Calvinistic/Puritan ideals, or
Melville’s salute to Hawthorne.
3. Melville’s encounter with Hawthorne changes him. He calls
his ideas from this encounter the “power of darkness.”
Explain why this is an accurate description of the encounter
Melville might have.
4. How does the encounter with Ishmael and Queequeg
symbolize Melville’s democratic ideals?
5. Find two metaphors in the text that link the physical with the
mental.
6. Give two or more examples of Melville’s national pride.
7. As Melville discusses the greatness of The White Whale, he
has a give and take discussion with his imaginary critics.
Locate this passage and explain the effect this has on the
reader.
8. Interpret the “All visible objects…are but pasteboard masks”
passage (the whole passage) with regards to the characters in
the novel and all of humanity. This is Ahab’s speech in the
“Quarterdeck” chapter.
9. How is the sea symbolic of our soul? (Check out “The Lee
Shore” chapter)
10.
Why do critics refer to Ahab’s quest as a “Promethean”
challenge? (Recall your study of the Greek myth “Prometheus”
from 10th grade)
11.
How does Peleg and Bildad’s comment about Ahab as an
“ungodly, godlike man” foreshadow for Ahab’s actions
throughout the novel?
12.
Give an example or two of Melville’s belief that spirit
resides beneath matter.
13.
Analyze the diction, metaphor, and meaning in the 19th
paragraph in the chapter titled “Moby Dick”.
14.
How is the chapter “The Whiteness of the Whale” a
commentary about our society?
15.
Why is “The Whiteness of the Whale” the novel’s most
famous chapter?
16.
What happens to Pip after falling into the ocean the
second time? How is this explanation paradoxical?
17.
“The Doubloon” is a very important chapter about
perception of truth. Explain why and how this theme is
pervasive throughout the novel.
18.
Summarize the Ahab’s speech to Starbuck in “The
Symphony.”
19.
Explain the last sentence in the next to the last
paragraph in “The Chase-Third Day”.
20.
How and why did Ishmael survive—what allusions
and/or symbols are evident?